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Speaker 1: Get in touch with technology with tech Stuff from how

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Speaker 1: stuff works dot com. Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff.

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Speaker 1: I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer at

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Speaker 1: how stuff Works and I love all things tech. And

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Speaker 1: it's time for another classic episode of tech Stuff. And

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Speaker 1: recently I did an enormous series about space travel, and

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Speaker 1: I've given you guys a few days to recover from that,

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Speaker 1: but now it's time to go back. This classic episode

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Speaker 1: has Chris Polette and I talking about the Curiosity Project,

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Speaker 1: the Curiosity Project that went to Mars, and it was

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Speaker 1: an incredible mission and one that was really inspiring for us,

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Speaker 1: so we had a great time talking about it. We

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Speaker 1: originally published this episode all the way back on August

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Speaker 1: twenty nine, two thousand and twelve. I hope you guys

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Speaker 1: enjoy it. Let's listen in today we are going to

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Speaker 1: talk about stuff. What beeps? Yes, stuff, what beeps? What

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Speaker 1: we shoot off into space to hit the red planet

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Speaker 1: that is near us sometimes near us? And well it's

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Speaker 1: funny because there there is another science podcast around here somewhere. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: stuff to blow your mind. Yeah, we're not talking about

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Speaker 1: them because we decided, well, occasionally we talked about the

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Speaker 1: same stuff because we're fascinated by it, and we decided

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Speaker 1: that we didn't care if they talk about this. There's

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Speaker 1: overlap because we wanted to talk about the Mars rover. Yes,

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Speaker 1: and and specifically we're talking about the Curiosity rover, which

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Speaker 1: successfully touched down on the surface of Mars, despite the

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Speaker 1: fact that the way of delivering said rover to the

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Speaker 1: surface of Mars was I think the scientific term is

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Speaker 1: absolutely freaking crazy. I was gonna say nuts, but that'll work. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: that's that's the short version of the full scientific term. Um. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: And we want to talk about why is it such

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Speaker 1: a big deal, why is it so hard to get

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Speaker 1: to Mars, and sort of talk about some of the

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Speaker 1: historical missions that led up to Curiosity as well as

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Speaker 1: the Curiosity mission itself. So, um, do you let's say that,

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Speaker 1: let's say we're talking about the success failure rate of

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Speaker 1: missions to Mars. Yeah. Um, depending not pleasant to talk about,

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Speaker 1: depending upon how you define success or failure. Uh. One

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Speaker 1: of the more common statistics I've seen, or are figures

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Speaker 1: I've seen, is that twenty three out of thirty eight

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Speaker 1: missions sent to Mars failed in some way. Yeah, all right,

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Speaker 1: which gives it a pretty dismal success rate. Are you.

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Speaker 1: Are you speaking of all missions to Mars a missions tomorrow?

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Speaker 1: So anybody who's ever shot something at the Red Planet,

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Speaker 1: anyone anyone on Earth. We just we can't just pointing

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Speaker 1: that out. We can't really talk about anyone from outside

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Speaker 1: of Earth. We don't know. Good point, but I meant

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Speaker 1: not you not it states. Of course we are located

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Speaker 1: in the United States, and why I just wanted to

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Speaker 1: point out that you're not talking You're talking at Earthlings.

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Speaker 1: The United States success failure rate is better. It's thirteen

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Speaker 1: successes out of eighteen tries prior to curiosity, I think

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Speaker 1: it is. It is important to point out too, that

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Speaker 1: the United States has been later to the let's throw

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Speaker 1: stuff at the Red planet party, and so maybe part

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Speaker 1: of the failures of the Soviet Union is well, part

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Speaker 1: of them is due to the fact that the Soviet

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Speaker 1: Union is no more. But when they were very active

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Speaker 1: at this, they were maybe not so good at it.

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Speaker 1: They were the probably be better at it now they

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Speaker 1: were the only ones doing it at the time. Yes

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Speaker 1: they were. So you might say, well, why is the

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Speaker 1: why is this success rates so low? Mars is hard

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Speaker 1: it's it's hard to get to and and here's the

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Speaker 1: moon might be a little closer. Yeah, let's I'll give

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Speaker 1: you some figures here. So the average distance between Earth

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Speaker 1: and the Moon is about two thou in nine miles

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Speaker 1: or three four thousand, four hundred kilometers. That's about how

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Speaker 1: far it is from Earth to the Moon. And it

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Speaker 1: takes a few days for us to send something to

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Speaker 1: go land on the Moon. So for example, astronauts aboard

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Speaker 1: and Apollo Capsule take a few days to get there,

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Speaker 1: and to get there in a few more days to

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Speaker 1: get back. Um, but that's that's doable. We did do it,

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Speaker 1: so clearly it's doable. It's a vacation. Getting someone to Mars.

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Speaker 1: Getting anything to Mars takes a lot more time. Now.

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Speaker 1: Part of that is because the distance between Earth and

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Speaker 1: Mars is not constant. And the reason for that is

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Speaker 1: that you know, both planets are going around the Sun, right,

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Speaker 1: but they're going at different speeds and their orbits are

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Speaker 1: different sizes. So there are times when Earth and Mars

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Speaker 1: are aligned and they are about as close as they

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Speaker 1: poss can be. And there are other times where Earth

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Speaker 1: is on one side of the Sun and Mars is

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Speaker 1: on the other side of the Sun, and they're about

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Speaker 1: as far apart as they possibly can be, so the

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Speaker 1: distance varies dramatically. At the closest earthen, Mars are about

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Speaker 1: thirty three million, nine hundred thousand miles apart or fifty

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Speaker 1: four million, six hundred thousand kilometers. So to compare again

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Speaker 1: to the Moon, the Moon was two hundred thirty eight thousand,

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Speaker 1: nine hundred miles away, Mars thirty three million, nine hundred

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Speaker 1: thousand miles away, So that's not a day trip way further,

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Speaker 1: and that's at its closest. At its furthest away, Mars

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Speaker 1: is about two hundred forty nine million, one hundred sixty

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Speaker 1: thousand miles away or four hundred one million kilometers away.

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Speaker 1: So if you're gonna make a mission to Mars of

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Speaker 1: any kind, um then you need to do a lot

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Speaker 1: of thinking about it and and plan in beforehand, because

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Speaker 1: you need to decide, Okay, well, what are we gonna

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Speaker 1: send there. We're gonna send a rover, um man, how

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Speaker 1: how much is that gonnaway? Well, it's gonna weigh about

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Speaker 1: this much? How much you know, rocket tuge do we

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Speaker 1: need to throw at it? Okay, so you got your

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Speaker 1: you've got your rocket tude, and your just makesically think

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Speaker 1: like some sort of nineteen eighties side scrolling video game. Rocket.

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Speaker 1: I'm going to write that, um and your rover, you

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Speaker 1: know what, you know what you wanted to do, you

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Speaker 1: know how to get it there? Uh, you start having

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Speaker 1: to think about all sorts of other stuff. Okay, well,

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Speaker 1: so how much gravity? Uh does Mars have? How much

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Speaker 1: difference in the weight is there going to be once

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Speaker 1: this this rover gets there? How are you know how

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Speaker 1: much atmospheric interference is going to be there? Okay, so

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Speaker 1: you're gonna have to plan how long it's gonna take

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Speaker 1: for you to shoot this thing into space and get

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Speaker 1: to Mars, and how it's gonna stop when it gets there. Oh,

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Speaker 1: and then you have to take a new account. If

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Speaker 1: you know roughly how long it's gonna take. Where are

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Speaker 1: the two planets going to be? Yeah, you have to

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Speaker 1: figure out when you're from there and go, Okay, they're

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Speaker 1: going to be at their closest here, so we have

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Speaker 1: to launch it then can make that happen. Technically, you

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Speaker 1: even have to launch it before then, because you have

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Speaker 1: to do what's called a transfer orbit. So so by

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Speaker 1: the let's let's say let's say we've got to the point.

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Speaker 1: By the way, it takes about two years for Earth

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Speaker 1: and Mars to line up so that they are at

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Speaker 1: their closest, and then it will take another two years

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Speaker 1: before they are at that same position relative to one another.

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Speaker 1: So there's a two year gap between when uh your

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Speaker 1: closest when you're not and close is important because that

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Speaker 1: determines how much fuel you're going to need to get

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Speaker 1: whatever it is you're sending to Mars there. And fuel

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Speaker 1: is heavy because we depend on you know, uh, these

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Speaker 1: these chemical fuels that are you know, these solid chemical

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Speaker 1: fuels that that weigh a lot, They give off a

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Speaker 1: lot of energy and they are about as a fish

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Speaker 1: sent as we possibly can be with chemical uh fuel.

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Speaker 1: But um, yeah, their weight factors into the whole calculation.

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Speaker 1: So you want to use as as little fuel as

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Speaker 1: possible to get your your spacecraft to Mars to be

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Speaker 1: as efficient as you possibly can be. This is also

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Speaker 1: why it's really difficult to talk about a manned mission

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Speaker 1: to Mars. I'll get to that in a second. But um,

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Speaker 1: so you when you when Earth and Mars are closest together,

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Speaker 1: if you were to launch at that point, Well, you know,

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Speaker 1: you can't just point the rocket at Mars where Mars

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Speaker 1: is right now, because it is not gonna be there

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Speaker 1: by the time the the spacecraft would have made its

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Speaker 1: way to that point. You know, both planets are still

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Speaker 1: moving around the Sun, so your spacecraft would be going

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Speaker 1: to where Mars used to be, not to wear Mars

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Speaker 1: is going to be. So you actually have to planet

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Speaker 1: out ahead of time to make sure you are being

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Speaker 1: as economic as possible with your fuel use. So, yeah,

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Speaker 1: a paraphrase the great one, you have to launch the

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Speaker 1: rocket at where the planet's gonna be. Yeah, you gotta

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Speaker 1: shoot for where it will be, not for where it is.

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Speaker 1: So I'm sorry, go ahead, I was just gonna say so. Essentially,

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Speaker 1: there is a lot of thought that has to go

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Speaker 1: into this before before you even build the rocket, before

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Speaker 1: you even build the rover. You really have to think

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Speaker 1: about what you need to do to make it happen.

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Speaker 1: And so, you know, when you shoot something at the Moon,

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Speaker 1: the factors are lessened somewhat by the distance and and

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Speaker 1: the proximity of the Moon. You know what, you that

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Speaker 1: the orbit and all those things are are are lesser

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Speaker 1: and the more complex a project gets you know, the

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Speaker 1: more factors you have to deal with, and it's just

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Speaker 1: that that's going to make it more difficult to reach

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Speaker 1: Mars than it is to reach the Moon. And if

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Speaker 1: you were trying to reach Pluto, for example, the factors

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Speaker 1: get even more difficult. And Pluto's got such an odd

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Speaker 1: orbit anyway. So I mean, this is this is know,

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Speaker 1: this isn't rockets, so it's it's complex. It's not brain surgery,

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Speaker 1: so the yeah, so it takes about it takes about

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Speaker 1: between seven and eight months to get from Earth to

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Speaker 1: Mars using the methods that we have available to us today.

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Speaker 1: There are scientists who have suggested that we look into

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Speaker 1: using a nuclear powered propulsion system in order to get

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Speaker 1: from Earth to Mars, which would significantly reduce the weight

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Speaker 1: of your vehicle because you wouldn't have to have so

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Speaker 1: much chemical fuel aboard. But then there are other problems,

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Speaker 1: of course with the idea of the nuclear propulsion system,

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Speaker 1: especially if you're going to use some sort of chemical

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Speaker 1: propulsion to get you off the the surface of the

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Speaker 1: Earth into lower Earth orbit before you engage the nuclear

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Speaker 1: propulsion system. Having explosives next to a nuclear device makes

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Speaker 1: people nervous. I don't know why. There's also the possibility

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Speaker 1: that people have said of of building the spacecraft in

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Speaker 1: lowerth orbit, So you would have space missions that would

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Speaker 1: go out build this craft and lowerth orbit, and then

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Speaker 1: you solve the problem of having to escape Earth's gravity. Uh.

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Speaker 1: You engage the nuclear propulsion system then and that also

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Speaker 1: gets around it at any rate. So you've got about

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Speaker 1: seven to eight months to get to Mars, depending on

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Speaker 1: you exactly what you're sending there and and the timing involved. Uh.

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Speaker 1: This is and here's the reason why a manned mission

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Speaker 1: to Mars would be really really difficult. Let's say that

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Speaker 1: we sent let's say we we built the spacecraft that

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Speaker 1: that is capable of carrying a party of about six

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Speaker 1: astronauts to Mars. That tends to be about the number

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Speaker 1: of crew members that is considered ideal. Uh. This comes

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Speaker 1: from NASA, and NASA says that ideal number is somewhat

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Speaker 1: reached by You want to have enough of a mix

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Speaker 1: of people so that you can balance out any personality issues.

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Speaker 1: You also want to have enough so that you can

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Speaker 1: represent multiple nationalities because you have to have a lot

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Speaker 1: of partnerships with other countries in order for these projects

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Speaker 1: to come through, so there's a political element to it

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Speaker 1: as well. Um so let's say we've built the ship

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Speaker 1: that could hold six people, uh, that can hold all

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Speaker 1: the supplies they would need to get to Mars and back.

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Speaker 1: It would still take thirty two months from the time

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Speaker 1: you launch to the time you touched down back on

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Speaker 1: Earth to do a Mars mission. And the reason for

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Speaker 1: that is that because it takes seven to eight months.

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Speaker 1: You know, assuming that you're going for pure fuel economy

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Speaker 1: again to limit the weight of your spacecraft, takes seven

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Speaker 1: to eight months for you to get to Mars. By

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Speaker 1: the time you land on Mars, the Mars and the

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Speaker 1: Earth are no longer in that ideal situation where you

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Speaker 1: can easily get from one to the other. In fact,

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Speaker 1: at that point, by the time the Curiosity rover landed

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Speaker 1: on the surface of Mars, Mars was further away from

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Speaker 1: the Earth than the Earth was to the Sun. So

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Speaker 1: by the time you land, the Earth is further away

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Speaker 1: from you than the Sun would be if you were

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Speaker 1: still on Earth. So you have to wait for that

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Speaker 1: timing to be right again so that you can launch

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Speaker 1: from Mars and get back to Earth. That takes almost

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Speaker 1: two years, So from the time you leave to the

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Speaker 1: time you get back thirty two months past, so that's

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Speaker 1: a that's a very long mission. And during that whole

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Speaker 1: time you would also have to be able to to

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Speaker 1: not only provide all the resources your astronauts would need

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Speaker 1: to stay alive on the surface of Mars, which not

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Speaker 1: a very friendly planet for us, not too terribly accommodating.

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Speaker 1: It's it's not the worst, but it's not it's not

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Speaker 1: the best either. You would also have to figure out

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Speaker 1: how to protect them from things like radiation. The longer

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Speaker 1: you're out in space, the more likely you are to

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Speaker 1: encounter various forms of radiation that we are protected from

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Speaker 1: here on Earth due to factors like their's atmosphere and

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Speaker 1: its magnetic field. So you have to figure out how

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Speaker 1: do you protect the astronauts from things like I'm a

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Speaker 1: radiation out in space, so that they don't turn into

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Speaker 1: incredible incredible hulk or a cosmic race, so they don't

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Speaker 1: come back as the Fantastic six, because there would be

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Speaker 1: two more than the four UM. I also thought you

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Speaker 1: were going to point out that there need to be

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Speaker 1: enough people aboard so that when the aliens do start

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Speaker 1: bursting out of them that you know there's somebody left

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Speaker 1: at the end of Yeah, you have to have that

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Speaker 1: dramatic person at the end so they can come back

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Speaker 1: and tell the story and and and blame the corporation

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Speaker 1: from the documentary alien um the Yes. So there there

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Speaker 1: are a lot of factors that make it really really

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Speaker 1: hard for us to send amanned mission to Mars, which

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Speaker 1: is why the missions that we've sent to Mars so

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Speaker 1: far have been unmanned missions. And uh, even those have

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Speaker 1: not had a great success rate, although again the United

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Speaker 1: States success rate is significantly higher than if you were

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Speaker 1: to to think of the entire world UM, which is

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Speaker 1: mainly the USSR or SO Union at the time, UM

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Speaker 1: now would be Russia in the various countries around Russia. Uh.

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Speaker 1: The Japan also has attempted to send missions to Mars,

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Speaker 1: and there was I think a European mission as well.

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Speaker 1: So the the first attempt to send a mission to Mars,

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Speaker 1: an unmanned mission to Mars was in nineteen sixty by

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Speaker 1: the Soviet Union and it was called corrobl four KO

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Speaker 1: R A B L and R in the B in

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Speaker 1: our alphabet. I don't read cilic, so I couldn't tell

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Speaker 1: you the other version but um, yeah, that was in

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Speaker 1: nineteen sixty It did not even it didn't reach Earth orbit,

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Speaker 1: so that was a failure early on it did not

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Speaker 1: um even make it into lower th orbit, much less

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Speaker 1: out into Mars. I actually saw that one listed as

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Speaker 1: Mars Nick Mars Nick interested. Uh, so this is the

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Speaker 1: information I got was from NASA. Okay, so I was

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Speaker 1: going from an article and Wired, so yeah, this is

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Speaker 1: this is from NASA, so they had to Actually that

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Speaker 1: went around the same time CORRABL four and five according

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Speaker 1: to NASA, but I'm sure I had different names in

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Speaker 1: the Wired article. The first attempt by the United States

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Speaker 1: was in nineteen sixty four with the Mariner three UM,

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Speaker 1: which was it was supposed to be a fly by mission.

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Speaker 1: So this is a spacecraft that's supposed to pass by

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Speaker 1: Mars and take photos as it goes by. Uh. That

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Speaker 1: one was also a failure. The the shroud failed to jettison,

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Speaker 1: so it did not make it to Mars. But shortly thereafter,

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Speaker 1: the Mariner four was a successful fly by mission and

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Speaker 1: it returned twenty one images of Mars to Earth. So uh,

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Speaker 1: the United States first attempt was a failure, but the

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Speaker 1: second attempt succeeded. UM. There were a lot of attempts

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Speaker 1: since then. Uh. Some of them, many of them were flybys, UM.

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Speaker 1: Some of them were meant to be orbit ters. Uh.

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Speaker 1: A lot of launch failures, a lot of orbits that

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Speaker 1: were obtained, but then the device failed before it could

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Speaker 1: really retrieve a lot of information. The first success really

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Speaker 1: for the Soviet Union UM was the Mars five which

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Speaker 1: was in nineteen seventy three, and that was that returned

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Speaker 1: sixty images of the planet and it but it only

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Speaker 1: lasted nine days. Yeah, Mars to actually attempted to put

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Speaker 1: a lander on the surface, but not so much with

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Speaker 1: the success. Yeah, the orbiter actually arrived into the orbit

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Speaker 1: of Mars, but yeah, the lander did not did not

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Speaker 1: land successfully. Chris and I have more to say about

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Speaker 1: the Curiosity ander over on Mars, but before we get

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Speaker 1: to that, let's take a quick break to thank our sponsor.

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Speaker 1: One of the challenges again that I had read about,

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Speaker 1: especially with the recent coverage on Curiosity again recent as

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Speaker 1: of the time we're recording this UM, is that the

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Speaker 1: the atmosphere of Mars is very very unlike that of Earth.

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Speaker 1: It's very thin. Yes, So I mean, you know, if

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Speaker 1: you think about Uh, for example, the Space Shuttle coming

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Speaker 1: back in or the Mercury and Geminy missions. I love

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Speaker 1: doing that because Jonathan wins Is every time I see Geminy.

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Speaker 1: Some of the astronauts called it that though. Uh, you know,

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Speaker 1: using the heat shields and coming in and having the

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Speaker 1: heat shield you know, burning as it comes through the

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Speaker 1: Earth's atmosphere. Uh, Mars's atmosphere does not act as a

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Speaker 1: slower downer, not not as much. It does. It does

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Speaker 1: slow down the vehicle, but not as much. Yeah, I

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Speaker 1: think I was going to say that. Okay, well you

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Speaker 1: said and as you said that, you said it wasn't

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Speaker 1: a slower downer. I wanted to correct, well, not as

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Speaker 1: I was going to say, not as much as it

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Speaker 1: does here, and with gravity being so different there too.

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Speaker 1: Um it is those are our factors that the scientists

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Speaker 1: have to take into account. Um I if I am

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Speaker 1: not mistaken. You know there have been times when we

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Speaker 1: tried to use a big cushiony bouncy ball to try

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Speaker 1: to protect something and and it didn't work out to

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Speaker 1: what we But we have had Rover's Land using that approach. Um.

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Speaker 1: It's an air air bag approach, is really what it is.

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Speaker 1: A's airbags. Uh. Well, yes, the the atmosphere on Mars

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Speaker 1: is thinner than it is on Earth, and it does

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Speaker 1: not slow entry vehicles down to the same extent as

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Speaker 1: we would have here on Earth. So you have to

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Speaker 1: come up with other ways of slowing your entry vehicle

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Speaker 1: entry vehicle down, uh, if you don't want to go

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Speaker 1: boom on the surface of the planet. And there have

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Speaker 1: been a lot of different attempts to do that. So

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Speaker 1: previous attempts involved using parachutes, which can slow you down

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Speaker 1: a little bit, but even then the atmosphere is so

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Speaker 1: thin that you're going Uh. They, for example, the Curiosity

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Speaker 1: rover deployed the largest supersonic parachute NASA has ever built,

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Speaker 1: which way I think a hundred pounds total. That was

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Speaker 1: that was able to slow down the vehicle to two

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Speaker 1: miles per hour. Uh. And I don't have the kilometers

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Speaker 1: perer conversion. They're right in front of me, so I

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Speaker 1: apologized for that. But anyway, even at that speed, there

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Speaker 1: was no way the rover could land and maintain integrity.

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Speaker 1: It would have smashed to little tiny pieces. So they

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Speaker 1: had to find another way of slowing down. Uh. There

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Speaker 1: are other elements literally on Mars that make this difficult.

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Speaker 1: One of the potential things you could do is use

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Speaker 1: rockets to slow down your your entry vehicle. But the

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Speaker 1: closer you get to the surface of the planet, the

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Speaker 1: more those rockets are going to disturb the dust that's

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Speaker 1: on the surface. That dust can cause lots of problems.

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Speaker 1: If you have sensitive scientific equipment. This equipment might get

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Speaker 1: gummed up by dust. The dust could damage it so

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Speaker 1: that it's unusable, which means that you might land successfully,

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Speaker 1: but you can't actually retrieve any data because your instruments

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Speaker 1: are fouled by dust. Um the dust itself could also

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Speaker 1: be corrosive, so there's some real problems there. So you

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Speaker 1: have to figure out, well, if you can't just use rockets,

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Speaker 1: then you have to find some other balancing features so

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Speaker 1: that you can lower the rover itself onto the surface

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Speaker 1: without getting the rockets so close to the surface that

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Speaker 1: they start to disturb the dust about kilometers per hour.

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Speaker 1: Thank you so uh in some cases the way that

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Speaker 1: the rovers we have landed. Now, we we've also launched

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Speaker 1: orbiters that just orbit Mars and take uh scientific measurements

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Speaker 1: from orbit. So we've got some of those in orbit already. UM.

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Speaker 1: In fact, we've got a couple that we launched not

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Speaker 1: too long ago, we being the United States. UM. The

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Speaker 1: the there's the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, which was launched in

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Speaker 1: two thousand five and uh it's already returned more than

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Speaker 1: twenty six terra bits of data about the planet. There's

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Speaker 1: also the Odyssey Mars Odyssey, which was launched in two

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Speaker 1: thousand one UM and both of those have contributed a

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Speaker 1: lot to our scientific knowledge. The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has

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Speaker 1: a boarded a special camera called the High Resolution Imaging

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Speaker 1: Science Experiment or high RISE, and the high RISE actually

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Speaker 1: caught a great photo of the Curiosity rover as it

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Speaker 1: was landing with the parachute deployed. So you can actually

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Speaker 1: see the parachute, you can see the capsule that contained

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Speaker 1: the rover. You can if you look really carefully, you

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Speaker 1: can even see the heat shield that was jettisoned off

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Speaker 1: the bottom of the rover. We'll talk more about that

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Speaker 1: whole procedure in just a minute. UM. So, one of

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Speaker 1: the things you could do is you use rockets to

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Speaker 1: slow yourself down further from the parachute, so the parachute

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Speaker 1: gets you down to a certain speed. The rockets can

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Speaker 1: slow you down a little bit more, and then as

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Speaker 1: you get closer to the surface, you need to find

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Speaker 1: a way of lowering the rover itself so that the

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Speaker 1: rockets don't disturb the dust too much. One way of

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Speaker 1: doing that is to lower the rover, uh to essentially

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Speaker 1: drop it with all these air bags around it, which

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Speaker 1: cushioned the blow, and it lands and then it retrieves

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Speaker 1: the air bags and or or emerges from the air

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Speaker 1: bags and continues on submission. That's how the smaller rovers

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Speaker 1: um landed from the smaller ones being things like the

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Speaker 1: Spirit and the Opportunity, uh, the Phoenix Lander, things like

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Speaker 1: that used those sort of approaches because um they were

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Speaker 1: they were small enough where it wasn't that it wasn't

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Speaker 1: as huge a challenge. With the Curiosity Rover. You're talking

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Speaker 1: about a one ton vehicle, and at that size, the

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Speaker 1: size of the air bags you would need are so

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Speaker 1: huge that you would really run the risk of even

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Speaker 1: if everything worked properly, you would run the risk of

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Speaker 1: fouling the drive system of the Curiosity Rover because it

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Speaker 1: has to get out of this enormous air bag. So

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Speaker 1: that was considered too risky. Another approach is to put

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Speaker 1: uh these so pretty much like stilts, like landing stilts,

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Speaker 1: so that when the the rockets lower the the descent

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Speaker 1: vehicle down, the the stilts touch ground and keep the

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Speaker 1: rockets at an elevation high enough so that they aren't

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Speaker 1: disturbing the dust too much, and then the rover can

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Speaker 1: drop down from there. Again. With the Curiosity rover, it

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Speaker 1: was so large and heavy, the stilts would have had

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Speaker 1: to have been way too tall to do this in

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Speaker 1: a way that would have been easy to do. And

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Speaker 1: also it would have really made it difficult to ensure

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Speaker 1: that the Curiosity would be undamaged as it came down.

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Speaker 1: So they had to come up with a different way

431
00:25:04,560 --> 00:25:07,000
Speaker 1: to get the Curiosity Rover onto the surface of Earth.

432
00:25:07,480 --> 00:25:13,840
Speaker 1: And it was insane. A sky crane. Sky crane. Yeah,

433
00:25:13,960 --> 00:25:17,160
Speaker 1: so that sounds that sounds like some kind of strange,

434
00:25:17,440 --> 00:25:21,080
Speaker 1: other worldly company. And so we'll walk you through how

435
00:25:21,200 --> 00:25:24,320
Speaker 1: how this unfolded. And it's still incredible to me that

436
00:25:24,359 --> 00:25:27,320
Speaker 1: this worked well. I think, um, and I don't mean

437
00:25:27,359 --> 00:25:29,399
Speaker 1: this in any way to be a slight to the

438
00:25:29,440 --> 00:25:32,880
Speaker 1: scientists behind this. I think they were a little astonished. Well,

439
00:25:32,920 --> 00:25:39,679
Speaker 1: the reaction that we saw at the and as we

440
00:25:39,760 --> 00:25:42,399
Speaker 1: learned that the Curiosity had in fact landed successfully. And

441
00:25:42,760 --> 00:25:44,359
Speaker 1: by the way, by the time we knew that the

442
00:25:44,359 --> 00:25:48,600
Speaker 1: Curiosity was successful in its landing, it had been on

443
00:25:48,680 --> 00:25:52,719
Speaker 1: the surface of Mars for several minutes. Because again Mars

444
00:25:52,800 --> 00:25:55,960
Speaker 1: is further away at the point of the Curiosity landing

445
00:25:56,560 --> 00:25:58,439
Speaker 1: from Earth than the Earth is to the Sun. It

446
00:25:58,480 --> 00:26:00,639
Speaker 1: takes it takes about eight minutes for light from the

447
00:26:00,680 --> 00:26:04,760
Speaker 1: Sun to get to Earth. It takes fourteen minutes for

448
00:26:04,880 --> 00:26:10,520
Speaker 1: electromagnetic communication to get from Mars to the Earth Internet

449
00:26:10,560 --> 00:26:13,800
Speaker 1: now fourteen minutes for that information to get to us.

450
00:26:14,000 --> 00:26:18,160
Speaker 1: It takes seven minutes from the time the landing capsule

451
00:26:18,359 --> 00:26:21,440
Speaker 1: enters the Martian atmosphere to the point where Curiosity would

452
00:26:21,440 --> 00:26:25,040
Speaker 1: touch down. That means there's a seven minute gap where

453
00:26:25,080 --> 00:26:27,400
Speaker 1: things have already happened and we do not know what

454
00:26:27,440 --> 00:26:31,800
Speaker 1: they were. Yes, so it was seven minutes of terror,

455
00:26:32,440 --> 00:26:35,560
Speaker 1: which is I think brilliant. There was a wonderful video

456
00:26:35,680 --> 00:26:39,920
Speaker 1: NASA put out that was very dramatic, almost almost comedically so,

457
00:26:40,160 --> 00:26:42,960
Speaker 1: because it was like it was like a thriller movie, right,

458
00:26:43,600 --> 00:26:45,800
Speaker 1: but it was all about the seven minutes of terror.

459
00:26:45,840 --> 00:26:48,840
Speaker 1: The fact that you have to build a vehicle that's

460
00:26:49,280 --> 00:26:54,280
Speaker 1: operating autonomously for for you know, there's nothing you can do.

461
00:26:54,400 --> 00:26:57,280
Speaker 1: You can't make any adjustments because it's going to take

462
00:26:57,320 --> 00:26:59,320
Speaker 1: fourteen minutes for that information to get to you, and

463
00:26:59,320 --> 00:27:01,240
Speaker 1: then any information you send back it's going to take

464
00:27:01,240 --> 00:27:03,919
Speaker 1: fourteen minutes for it to get there. So by the

465
00:27:03,960 --> 00:27:06,440
Speaker 1: time you send any sort of information, by the time

466
00:27:06,480 --> 00:27:09,920
Speaker 1: you react to a changing condition, it doesn't matter. Things

467
00:27:09,920 --> 00:27:14,520
Speaker 1: have changed too much for that to have any effect. So, uh,

468
00:27:15,040 --> 00:27:18,480
Speaker 1: the capsule enters the Martian atmosphere, there's seven minutes until

469
00:27:18,520 --> 00:27:21,359
Speaker 1: it touches down, and then seven more minutes before we

470
00:27:21,400 --> 00:27:24,719
Speaker 1: find out that anything about it. The first thing that

471
00:27:24,760 --> 00:27:28,440
Speaker 1: happens is the atmosphere starts to slow down the capsule,

472
00:27:28,560 --> 00:27:31,080
Speaker 1: and like we said, it's a thin atmosphere, so it

473
00:27:31,119 --> 00:27:33,720
Speaker 1: doesn't slow it down that much. It is, however, thick

474
00:27:33,840 --> 00:27:38,399
Speaker 1: enough to cause lots of heat from friction. So it's

475
00:27:38,440 --> 00:27:42,560
Speaker 1: it's a double whammy for NASA right on the breaks exactly,

476
00:27:42,640 --> 00:27:44,359
Speaker 1: all the heat none of a break. So you have

477
00:27:44,480 --> 00:27:46,880
Speaker 1: to build a device that's capable with standing the heat.

478
00:27:47,240 --> 00:27:48,920
Speaker 1: But I have to make you have to take into

479
00:27:49,000 --> 00:27:51,440
Speaker 1: account the fact that the atmosphere is not going to

480
00:27:51,520 --> 00:27:53,199
Speaker 1: slow it down sufficiently enough for it to make a

481
00:27:53,200 --> 00:27:58,320
Speaker 1: safe landing. What a headache. So that's already tough. Capsule

482
00:27:58,400 --> 00:28:00,280
Speaker 1: enters the atmosphere, starts to heat up, has to have

483
00:28:00,320 --> 00:28:04,080
Speaker 1: a heat shield to protect the innerds because electronics don't

484
00:28:04,080 --> 00:28:07,680
Speaker 1: react well to heat. Said a billion times uh, not literally.

485
00:28:08,200 --> 00:28:13,120
Speaker 1: The once it reaches a certain altitude, uh, it deploys

486
00:28:13,160 --> 00:28:17,680
Speaker 1: the parachute, which slows down the the vehicle even more.

487
00:28:17,720 --> 00:28:19,600
Speaker 1: And so it started to slow down once it hits

488
00:28:19,600 --> 00:28:22,000
Speaker 1: the atmosphere. Actually takes a little while before it starts

489
00:28:22,040 --> 00:28:24,600
Speaker 1: to slow down, but it does slow down. Hitting the atmosphere,

490
00:28:24,640 --> 00:28:27,840
Speaker 1: the parachute slows it down further. Once it slows down

491
00:28:27,880 --> 00:28:30,879
Speaker 1: as much as it possibly can with the parachute, it

492
00:28:31,080 --> 00:28:36,000
Speaker 1: jettison the parachute, which is important because then it activates rockets.

493
00:28:36,080 --> 00:28:38,400
Speaker 1: So if it activated the rockets first, then there's the

494
00:28:38,600 --> 00:28:42,840
Speaker 1: danger of actually colliding with the parachute and fouling the

495
00:28:42,840 --> 00:28:47,080
Speaker 1: whole system. So jettison's the parachute, parachute flies off, and

496
00:28:47,120 --> 00:28:53,320
Speaker 1: then the rockets make a horizontal adjustment so that the

497
00:28:53,320 --> 00:28:55,720
Speaker 1: descent vehicle is not going to be in the same

498
00:28:55,720 --> 00:29:01,920
Speaker 1: path as the parachute. Uh. It eject the it detaches

499
00:29:02,000 --> 00:29:05,600
Speaker 1: the the heat shield as well. Actually I think that

500
00:29:05,640 --> 00:29:09,840
Speaker 1: even detaches while the parachutes deployed. Uh. And there are

501
00:29:09,880 --> 00:29:12,360
Speaker 1: sensors on the bottom of the rover which can help

502
00:29:12,480 --> 00:29:16,240
Speaker 1: guide the whole system, so it lands in the best spot. Now,

503
00:29:16,280 --> 00:29:19,600
Speaker 1: they were aiming for the Gael Crater, which is was

504
00:29:20,280 --> 00:29:23,400
Speaker 1: It's a crater that was created on Mars about three

505
00:29:23,520 --> 00:29:28,000
Speaker 1: billion years ago with a meteor impact, So they wanted

506
00:29:28,000 --> 00:29:32,120
Speaker 1: to land the rover in there. So the the sensors

507
00:29:32,120 --> 00:29:34,080
Speaker 1: on the bottom of the rover detect where the right

508
00:29:34,160 --> 00:29:37,800
Speaker 1: landing area is. The rockets position it properly and start

509
00:29:37,840 --> 00:29:42,400
Speaker 1: the descent, continuing to slow that that the scent so

510
00:29:42,400 --> 00:29:47,960
Speaker 1: that you're not plummeting to the surface. At about twenty

511
00:29:48,240 --> 00:29:55,240
Speaker 1: meters above the surface of the planet, the rover descends

512
00:29:55,320 --> 00:29:58,720
Speaker 1: on a on a set of cables from a crane

513
00:29:59,040 --> 00:30:02,320
Speaker 1: that's in that descent vehicle. So you've got a crane

514
00:30:02,600 --> 00:30:08,920
Speaker 1: essentially mounted on rockets lowering a one ton vehicle. The

515
00:30:09,000 --> 00:30:11,840
Speaker 1: cables I think we're about seven meters long, and so

516
00:30:12,000 --> 00:30:15,080
Speaker 1: it would then the rockets would then slowly allowed this

517
00:30:15,360 --> 00:30:18,240
Speaker 1: entire thing to descend until the wheels of the rover

518
00:30:18,480 --> 00:30:21,920
Speaker 1: made contact with the Martian soil. At that point, the

519
00:30:21,920 --> 00:30:26,760
Speaker 1: bridles holding the cables to the rover were jettisoned, and

520
00:30:26,800 --> 00:30:30,720
Speaker 1: then the the the descent vehicle with the rockets would

521
00:30:30,720 --> 00:30:35,000
Speaker 1: then launch itself about four away to crash on the

522
00:30:35,040 --> 00:30:38,920
Speaker 1: surface of the planet so that it would not um

523
00:30:39,120 --> 00:30:42,000
Speaker 1: cause any problems to the rover because you don't want it.

524
00:30:42,040 --> 00:30:45,840
Speaker 1: Tell just we've gently set the rover down. Oh and

525
00:30:45,880 --> 00:30:49,080
Speaker 1: then our descent vehicle landed on our rover. That's a bummer.

526
00:30:49,800 --> 00:30:51,960
Speaker 1: That would have been a bad thing. So the descent

527
00:30:52,080 --> 00:30:55,360
Speaker 1: vehicle went about four away and crash landed. Uh, and

528
00:30:55,440 --> 00:30:58,080
Speaker 1: the rover was safe on the planet. And we found

529
00:30:58,080 --> 00:31:00,520
Speaker 1: out about it seven minutes after it happened. And everyone

530
00:31:00,560 --> 00:31:04,280
Speaker 1: did a little dance and cheered and jumped and hugged

531
00:31:04,280 --> 00:31:06,440
Speaker 1: each other. I don't think they did a little dance.

532
00:31:06,440 --> 00:31:07,880
Speaker 1: I think they did a big dance. They did do

533
00:31:07,920 --> 00:31:10,320
Speaker 1: a big dance. And there are gifts out there that

534
00:31:10,480 --> 00:31:13,840
Speaker 1: show this that were very very popular. As soon I

535
00:31:13,840 --> 00:31:17,320
Speaker 1: mean like seconds after the footage at the Internet, there

536
00:31:17,320 --> 00:31:20,479
Speaker 1: were already memes about it. Yeah. Yeah, well, um, like

537
00:31:20,520 --> 00:31:22,120
Speaker 1: I said, I think they were a little surprised, but

538
00:31:22,160 --> 00:31:24,840
Speaker 1: in a in a positive way, Like they came up

539
00:31:24,880 --> 00:31:29,400
Speaker 1: with an excellent solution, but without ever you know, trying

540
00:31:29,400 --> 00:31:33,680
Speaker 1: it in practice. Um, you know it on Mars. They

541
00:31:33,720 --> 00:31:37,480
Speaker 1: weren't certain, especially with their past success rate, whether it

542
00:31:37,480 --> 00:31:40,040
Speaker 1: would work for sure or not, or would it deliver

543
00:31:40,200 --> 00:31:43,280
Speaker 1: the rover in excellent condition, which it did, so they

544
00:31:43,320 --> 00:31:46,920
Speaker 1: were they were very very happy about about that. And

545
00:31:47,120 --> 00:31:49,120
Speaker 1: it's it's something that you can't really test here on

546
00:31:49,160 --> 00:31:51,360
Speaker 1: Earth because the conditions here on Earth are so different

547
00:31:51,400 --> 00:31:54,040
Speaker 1: from on Mars that even if you were to build

548
00:31:54,080 --> 00:31:57,920
Speaker 1: something that works well on on here on our planet,

549
00:31:58,040 --> 00:32:00,080
Speaker 1: you cannot be certain that the same thing is going

550
00:32:00,120 --> 00:32:03,000
Speaker 1: to apply on Mars because the conditions are too different. Yeah,

551
00:32:03,320 --> 00:32:06,040
Speaker 1: so you know, it wasn't just engineered well on paper,

552
00:32:06,080 --> 00:32:09,080
Speaker 1: it actually in practice did did very very well. And

553
00:32:09,080 --> 00:32:12,440
Speaker 1: there's quite a lot of equipment on on Curiosity as well.

554
00:32:12,440 --> 00:32:16,640
Speaker 1: I mean there's seventeen cameras alone, uh, and most most

555
00:32:16,640 --> 00:32:20,200
Speaker 1: of those are navigational and hazard cameras, but there is

556
00:32:20,240 --> 00:32:23,600
Speaker 1: a mast. Uh. You know what my favorite piece of

557
00:32:23,640 --> 00:32:25,920
Speaker 1: equipment aboard the Curiosity is, or do I have to

558
00:32:25,920 --> 00:32:27,920
Speaker 1: ask what what? What is your favorite piece of equipment?

559
00:32:27,920 --> 00:32:34,680
Speaker 1: It's a lazier, which the laser is used to concentrate

560
00:32:34,800 --> 00:32:40,360
Speaker 1: a very focused beam of of light on rocks in

561
00:32:40,400 --> 00:32:44,120
Speaker 1: the Martian soil, and UH they it does listen very

562
00:32:44,240 --> 00:32:47,560
Speaker 1: very short bursts, like five ninosecond long bursts, and after

563
00:32:47,600 --> 00:32:52,120
Speaker 1: about seventy bursts of this high powered, intense laser, it

564
00:32:52,200 --> 00:32:57,080
Speaker 1: starts to a blate or evaporate the rock that it's

565
00:32:57,080 --> 00:33:00,400
Speaker 1: focused on. And then what happens is a special camera,

566
00:33:01,240 --> 00:33:05,520
Speaker 1: actually three different cameras will get information from our three

567
00:33:05,520 --> 00:33:08,960
Speaker 1: different sensors will get information from a telescopic camera that

568
00:33:09,000 --> 00:33:13,880
Speaker 1: will analyze the plasma this rock gives off, and by

569
00:33:13,880 --> 00:33:19,000
Speaker 1: analyzing the plasma through UH spectroscopes, they can determine what

570
00:33:19,800 --> 00:33:24,200
Speaker 1: chemical elements made up the rock itself. So essentially, what

571
00:33:24,280 --> 00:33:27,400
Speaker 1: you're doing is you're burning something. Looking at burning is

572
00:33:28,160 --> 00:33:31,400
Speaker 1: an oversimplification, but you're burning something, looking at the fumes

573
00:33:31,400 --> 00:33:34,360
Speaker 1: it gives off, and based upon those you determine what

574
00:33:34,480 --> 00:33:36,920
Speaker 1: the stuff is made of. The reason for this is

575
00:33:36,960 --> 00:33:39,840
Speaker 1: one so we can learn more about the composition of Mars,

576
00:33:39,840 --> 00:33:44,040
Speaker 1: but to also look for things that could be foundational

577
00:33:44,120 --> 00:33:48,560
Speaker 1: building blocks to support life. Now, curiosity is not looking

578
00:33:48,680 --> 00:33:51,480
Speaker 1: for evidence of life itself. It is not looking for

579
00:33:51,600 --> 00:33:56,680
Speaker 1: microscopic life because it doesn't have any equipment aboard the

580
00:33:56,760 --> 00:34:00,320
Speaker 1: rover itself capable of seeing things that that result Lucian.

581
00:34:00,760 --> 00:34:03,840
Speaker 1: So it's not looking for evidence of microscopic life that's

582
00:34:03,920 --> 00:34:07,200
Speaker 1: currently there on Mars. It's really looking for all the

583
00:34:07,240 --> 00:34:10,120
Speaker 1: elements that would need to be in place for life

584
00:34:10,160 --> 00:34:13,800
Speaker 1: to have at least one at one time been supported

585
00:34:13,880 --> 00:34:18,160
Speaker 1: on Mars. That, however, has not stopped all the other

586
00:34:18,239 --> 00:34:21,759
Speaker 1: memes that have gone around where there have been pictures

587
00:34:22,080 --> 00:34:27,840
Speaker 1: circulated from curiosity and of course uh these pictures of curiosities. Uh,

588
00:34:28,120 --> 00:34:31,360
Speaker 1: from curiosity's point of view, across the surface of Mars

589
00:34:31,440 --> 00:34:36,600
Speaker 1: is it's big and flat. However, duty so far, the

590
00:34:36,719 --> 00:34:40,359
Speaker 1: life forms I have seen superimposed over that landscape on

591
00:34:41,200 --> 00:34:45,880
Speaker 1: social media include Marvin the Martian from this Q thirty

592
00:34:45,880 --> 00:34:51,520
Speaker 1: two Space modul tour from uh, the Looney Tunes cartoons, uh,

593
00:34:51,600 --> 00:34:56,279
Speaker 1: the Muppets from uh that that that go yep yep up.

594
00:34:58,960 --> 00:35:01,480
Speaker 1: And I did see a couple of days ago some

595
00:35:01,640 --> 00:35:04,800
Speaker 1: ad apts walking across the surface. So the empire is

596
00:35:04,840 --> 00:35:09,880
Speaker 1: apparently they're already um, very very amusing all terrain attack

597
00:35:09,920 --> 00:35:12,640
Speaker 1: transports or something like that. That's what it means. Yes, yes,

598
00:35:12,880 --> 00:35:17,680
Speaker 1: So from Star Wars UM documentary Star Wars. Yeah, but

599
00:35:17,680 --> 00:35:20,120
Speaker 1: but yeah, they there are several different cameras. They're they're

600
00:35:20,120 --> 00:35:25,440
Speaker 1: taking photos three d um. So the James Cameron contingent

601
00:35:25,520 --> 00:35:29,439
Speaker 1: is there, black and white colorful avatars are running around

602
00:35:29,440 --> 00:35:33,680
Speaker 1: of there. Yep, yep. Um. So basically they're they're doing

603
00:35:33,680 --> 00:35:40,120
Speaker 1: all kinds of of imaging and analysis of the planet's surface. Um.

604
00:35:40,200 --> 00:35:43,520
Speaker 1: And you know they're it's it's pretty awesome to be

605
00:35:43,600 --> 00:35:45,400
Speaker 1: able to do this kind of work. Yeah, this is

606
00:35:45,440 --> 00:35:49,200
Speaker 1: a this is an evolutionary step from what the previous

607
00:35:49,760 --> 00:35:53,360
Speaker 1: rovers we've seen up there, like Phoenix and Spirit and Opportunity,

608
00:35:53,400 --> 00:35:59,040
Speaker 1: where they were all very much geologic, uh, instruments, geological

609
00:35:59,080 --> 00:36:02,680
Speaker 1: instruments really, so the geological formation of Mars and it's

610
00:36:02,680 --> 00:36:05,880
Speaker 1: geological features. We have a bit more to say about

611
00:36:05,920 --> 00:36:08,920
Speaker 1: the Curiosity project over on Mars, but I'm gonna go

612
00:36:08,960 --> 00:36:11,839
Speaker 1: get myself a Mars bar and you guys can take

613
00:36:11,840 --> 00:36:22,680
Speaker 1: a quick break and listen to our sponsor. Curiosity is

614
00:36:22,719 --> 00:36:27,040
Speaker 1: more of like a fully fledged scientific laboratory that is

615
00:36:27,080 --> 00:36:30,640
Speaker 1: on wheels and moves very very slowly. Uh. It's got

616
00:36:30,800 --> 00:36:32,879
Speaker 1: but it's got a lot of sophisticated equipment like you said,

617
00:36:32,880 --> 00:36:36,239
Speaker 1: it has that mast that projects above the rover itself self.

618
00:36:36,320 --> 00:36:40,640
Speaker 1: Gun arm Um. You mentioned the KEM CAM, which is

619
00:36:40,640 --> 00:36:45,400
Speaker 1: the laser. It's got a chemistry and mineralogy experiment or

620
00:36:45,440 --> 00:36:50,240
Speaker 1: instrument called KEMEN. They remember we talked about the different

621
00:36:50,280 --> 00:36:55,520
Speaker 1: parts of the Space Shuttle group. They love love love acronyms.

622
00:36:55,680 --> 00:37:00,000
Speaker 1: So the CAM in instrument looks at minerals to identify

623
00:37:00,080 --> 00:37:03,680
Speaker 1: whether water could have been there. Then there's the rover

624
00:37:03,840 --> 00:37:09,319
Speaker 1: Environmental Environmental Monitoring Station or MS, which will give you

625
00:37:09,360 --> 00:37:16,680
Speaker 1: the weather report. Yes it's not raining again. Uh. There

626
00:37:16,760 --> 00:37:19,799
Speaker 1: there's so much aboard and um. One of the other

627
00:37:19,840 --> 00:37:22,400
Speaker 1: things I think has been really remarkable about the past

628
00:37:22,440 --> 00:37:28,359
Speaker 1: few missions to Mars is NASA's ability to communicate this

629
00:37:28,440 --> 00:37:31,800
Speaker 1: information in a way that is really exciting to people

630
00:37:31,840 --> 00:37:39,239
Speaker 1: who otherwise might not really have cared that much. The

631
00:37:39,280 --> 00:37:43,839
Speaker 1: space exploration history in the in the entire world has

632
00:37:43,880 --> 00:37:47,160
Speaker 1: really gone through sort of a roller coaster of as

633
00:37:47,239 --> 00:37:50,040
Speaker 1: far as the public interest is concerned, right, because you

634
00:37:50,080 --> 00:37:55,400
Speaker 1: had the space race for the Moon, which was politically motivated,

635
00:37:55,440 --> 00:38:00,719
Speaker 1: I mean that was that was really all a few old,

636
00:38:00,920 --> 00:38:05,400
Speaker 1: not literally but metaphorically by the political opposition of the

637
00:38:05,480 --> 00:38:09,920
Speaker 1: United States and the Soviet Union, And so once we

638
00:38:10,000 --> 00:38:14,320
Speaker 1: landed men on the Moon and got them back safely, uh,

639
00:38:14,400 --> 00:38:19,360
Speaker 1: the political uh motivation to push people out into space

640
00:38:19,480 --> 00:38:22,600
Speaker 1: really diminished, which is part of the reason why we

641
00:38:22,640 --> 00:38:25,480
Speaker 1: didn't start immediately looking at Mars as being the next step,

642
00:38:25,640 --> 00:38:30,279
Speaker 1: because a lot of the excitement and enthusiasm and funding

643
00:38:30,719 --> 00:38:33,840
Speaker 1: had gone away because we already achieved this other amazing

644
00:38:34,239 --> 00:38:39,360
Speaker 1: and insanely amazing goal of landing people on the Moon. Um. Then,

645
00:38:39,600 --> 00:38:42,640
Speaker 1: like we had the Space Shuttle era, which started off

646
00:38:42,760 --> 00:38:48,440
Speaker 1: with incredible interest. I mean, it was this amazing program,

647
00:38:48,440 --> 00:38:52,560
Speaker 1: but then Shuttle mission after Shuttle mission, people started to

648
00:38:52,600 --> 00:38:55,279
Speaker 1: think of it more as something that just happens and

649
00:38:55,440 --> 00:39:00,160
Speaker 1: less as something amazing and special because it was you know,

650
00:39:00,239 --> 00:39:02,360
Speaker 1: it just seemed like, oh, yeah, another Shuttle mission is

651
00:39:02,360 --> 00:39:04,799
Speaker 1: going up, which is, when you think about it, that's

652
00:39:04,800 --> 00:39:07,600
Speaker 1: a crazy, crazy thing to just take for granted because

653
00:39:07,640 --> 00:39:09,800
Speaker 1: the amount of work it takes to get people into

654
00:39:09,800 --> 00:39:13,520
Speaker 1: space is phenomenal. But it did happen. Uh, once we

655
00:39:13,560 --> 00:39:17,120
Speaker 1: started sending missions to Mars and have them be a success,

656
00:39:17,600 --> 00:39:22,360
Speaker 1: you know, there were science fans who really thought was interesting,

657
00:39:22,360 --> 00:39:24,560
Speaker 1: but the general public, I don't know that necessarily cut

658
00:39:24,600 --> 00:39:28,839
Speaker 1: their attention. I think what really turned things around was

659
00:39:29,800 --> 00:39:34,800
Speaker 1: when NASA started to leverage social media and began to

660
00:39:34,920 --> 00:39:40,640
Speaker 1: use social media to to communicate scientific facts, figures, discoveries

661
00:39:40,640 --> 00:39:43,640
Speaker 1: to the general public. That got people excited, and beyond that,

662
00:39:44,400 --> 00:39:48,960
Speaker 1: they began to give almost a personality to some of

663
00:39:48,960 --> 00:39:51,640
Speaker 1: the equipment they sent out. That's that's funny. I don't

664
00:39:51,640 --> 00:39:55,520
Speaker 1: know if Jonathan heard this. This morning, UM, as I

665
00:39:55,640 --> 00:40:00,080
Speaker 1: was driving to the train station to come in for

666
00:40:00,160 --> 00:40:03,720
Speaker 1: this podcast, I was listening to National Public Radio NPR

667
00:40:03,880 --> 00:40:05,760
Speaker 1: here in the United States, and there was an interview

668
00:40:06,320 --> 00:40:10,839
Speaker 1: UM with Veronica McGregor now Veronica McGregor. She was the

669
00:40:10,880 --> 00:40:14,840
Speaker 1: person who was in charge of updating a Twitter account

670
00:40:15,120 --> 00:40:19,959
Speaker 1: for the Phoenix Mars Rover, and the Phoenix Mars Rover

671
00:40:20,200 --> 00:40:24,520
Speaker 1: ended up getting an enormous number of fans following it,

672
00:40:25,040 --> 00:40:31,120
Speaker 1: and it was able to know through the Phoenix Twitter feed,

673
00:40:31,560 --> 00:40:34,920
Speaker 1: NASA was able to communicate a lot of interesting scientific information.

674
00:40:34,960 --> 00:40:38,040
Speaker 1: But Veronica went a little step further and gave the

675
00:40:38,040 --> 00:40:43,200
Speaker 1: Phoenix sort of again a personality. And I'll never forget.

676
00:40:43,280 --> 00:40:46,480
Speaker 1: I mean, I remember I followed the Phoenix rover and

677
00:40:46,520 --> 00:40:50,759
Speaker 1: it was truly an emotional moment. When the second to

678
00:40:50,880 --> 00:40:54,280
Speaker 1: last tweet the Phoenix sent out during its official mission

679
00:40:54,880 --> 00:40:58,279
Speaker 1: was It's very unlikely I'll wake up next spring, but

680
00:40:58,360 --> 00:41:01,080
Speaker 1: if I do, I'll call home. Go luck with your project.

681
00:41:01,480 --> 00:41:06,080
Speaker 1: And people thought about that, like, there's this little robot

682
00:41:06,840 --> 00:41:11,160
Speaker 1: all alone, not really all alone. There are other robots

683
00:41:11,160 --> 00:41:14,000
Speaker 1: on Mars too, but they're really far away. So more

684
00:41:14,040 --> 00:41:15,880
Speaker 1: or less, there's this little robot all alone on the

685
00:41:15,920 --> 00:41:20,200
Speaker 1: surface of this planet, uh, you know, miles and miles

686
00:41:20,200 --> 00:41:24,040
Speaker 1: and miles away from Earth, and it is doing science

687
00:41:24,080 --> 00:41:27,040
Speaker 1: for us, and it's doing it selflessly, and it's about

688
00:41:27,120 --> 00:41:30,719
Speaker 1: to die because it's solar circuits aren't going to get

689
00:41:30,840 --> 00:41:33,560
Speaker 1: enough juice to keep it going, and there's and by

690
00:41:33,560 --> 00:41:38,440
Speaker 1: the time it comes out of that that essentially Martian Winter,

691
00:41:38,920 --> 00:41:41,400
Speaker 1: for lack of a better term, by the time it

692
00:41:41,440 --> 00:41:43,759
Speaker 1: comes out, it will not be able to reboot it

693
00:41:43,840 --> 00:41:47,000
Speaker 1: system and it will be a dead piece of technology.

694
00:41:47,840 --> 00:41:51,359
Speaker 1: It impacted people, I mean, people got teary eyed over

695
00:41:51,400 --> 00:41:55,200
Speaker 1: the idea because they, yeah, people had had humanized this

696
00:41:55,320 --> 00:42:00,200
Speaker 1: inanimate well animated but on a live object and has

697
00:42:00,200 --> 00:42:05,480
Speaker 1: no actual feelings or personality. But Veronica had really imbued

698
00:42:05,719 --> 00:42:09,920
Speaker 1: this thing with that kind of sense of purpose and

699
00:42:09,920 --> 00:42:13,160
Speaker 1: and personality that people identified with, and it made a

700
00:42:13,200 --> 00:42:16,960
Speaker 1: powerful statement and I think people connected to the space

701
00:42:17,000 --> 00:42:20,640
Speaker 1: mission in a way they hadn't in many years. And

702
00:42:20,760 --> 00:42:23,440
Speaker 1: NASA has continued that trend. And uh the last Twitter

703
00:42:23,480 --> 00:42:26,760
Speaker 1: post it posted was all in binary and it's spelled

704
00:42:26,760 --> 00:42:33,000
Speaker 1: out triumph all making a note here. Huge success. Well,

705
00:42:33,640 --> 00:42:36,799
Speaker 1: they talked to Veronica McGregor this morning. She is the

706
00:42:36,840 --> 00:42:40,399
Speaker 1: social media manager UM and is at it again. There

707
00:42:40,480 --> 00:42:44,280
Speaker 1: there's a team of three women who, according to NPR,

708
00:42:44,360 --> 00:42:49,080
Speaker 1: who work on the Curiosity rovers Twitter account, which has

709
00:42:49,120 --> 00:42:52,359
Speaker 1: according to this uh UM Chicago Tribune, I couldn't remember

710
00:42:52,440 --> 00:42:54,759
Speaker 1: Veronica's last name, so I looked it up and and

711
00:42:54,800 --> 00:42:58,239
Speaker 1: this article posted earlier today. As of right now, more

712
00:42:58,280 --> 00:43:03,120
Speaker 1: than eight hundred thousand followers UM already for Curiosity, so

713
00:43:03,160 --> 00:43:05,439
Speaker 1: they will be following through the mission just in case

714
00:43:05,440 --> 00:43:09,880
Speaker 1: you're curious. According to Veronica McGregor, the Curiosity as as

715
00:43:09,920 --> 00:43:13,080
Speaker 1: she it has a female, she said. According to them,

716
00:43:13,080 --> 00:43:15,200
Speaker 1: they had sort of talked about it and they they

717
00:43:15,239 --> 00:43:18,839
Speaker 1: feel they get this feeling that it's a her. So

718
00:43:19,440 --> 00:43:22,440
Speaker 1: I don't know, you go girl, it's interesting. But well,

719
00:43:22,520 --> 00:43:25,200
Speaker 1: if if you put yourself in the shoes of someone

720
00:43:25,200 --> 00:43:28,960
Speaker 1: who is talking about this. Um, you know you you

721
00:43:29,040 --> 00:43:30,920
Speaker 1: kind of have to make a personality as you're building

722
00:43:30,920 --> 00:43:33,040
Speaker 1: your personality, like you know what, I think, I think

723
00:43:33,040 --> 00:43:36,840
Speaker 1: it's a woman, but I do. I do remember listening

724
00:43:36,840 --> 00:43:39,680
Speaker 1: to or watching videos of the engineers talked about the

725
00:43:39,680 --> 00:43:44,480
Speaker 1: Curiosity and they referred to the entire vehicle as a she,

726
00:43:44,640 --> 00:43:47,200
Speaker 1: which at the time I didn't think unusual because I

727
00:43:47,320 --> 00:43:51,680
Speaker 1: like the votes ships not boats. Well, some boats I

728
00:43:51,719 --> 00:43:57,239
Speaker 1: think of. I think of ships or hurricanes. Um, the Enterprise, Yeah,

729
00:43:57,400 --> 00:44:01,319
Speaker 1: the Star Trek, that's as she. Well. People have talked

730
00:44:01,320 --> 00:44:03,839
Speaker 1: about the expense of the mission, and I'm sure there

731
00:44:03,880 --> 00:44:07,280
Speaker 1: were people who are going, why on Earth were Mars?

732
00:44:07,320 --> 00:44:10,520
Speaker 1: Do you care if it's a male or a female? Were?

733
00:44:10,520 --> 00:44:14,040
Speaker 1: Over All, these things personalize it somewhat, and they do

734
00:44:14,160 --> 00:44:16,799
Speaker 1: make it more accessible to us, and they also get

735
00:44:16,880 --> 00:44:20,520
Speaker 1: us inspired to to try new things, to find ways

736
00:44:20,600 --> 00:44:25,560
Speaker 1: to grow better crops or pure diseases, or launch the

737
00:44:25,600 --> 00:44:28,440
Speaker 1: next mission to space. They make us want to try

738
00:44:28,640 --> 00:44:30,840
Speaker 1: something that we haven't been able to do before, and

739
00:44:31,600 --> 00:44:34,040
Speaker 1: it's valuable. The the effects that come out of this

740
00:44:34,320 --> 00:44:40,319
Speaker 1: are across so many different disciplines, so not only one.

741
00:44:40,360 --> 00:44:43,359
Speaker 1: We're learning about Mars. Two, we're learning more about our

742
00:44:43,400 --> 00:44:45,920
Speaker 1: solar system. Three, we're learning more about the Earth as

743
00:44:45,960 --> 00:44:49,480
Speaker 1: we learn what things are similar versus dissimilar between Mars

744
00:44:49,520 --> 00:44:54,120
Speaker 1: and Earth. And and go ahead. Four we're inspiring future

745
00:44:54,160 --> 00:44:59,239
Speaker 1: generations of scientists and engineers because this is genuinely exciting

746
00:44:59,320 --> 00:45:03,960
Speaker 1: and people, little kids will think that is amazing. Look

747
00:45:03,960 --> 00:45:06,239
Speaker 1: at what can be accomplished. I want to do that.

748
00:45:06,760 --> 00:45:10,239
Speaker 1: And and five you're promoting science in general to the

749
00:45:10,280 --> 00:45:14,279
Speaker 1: general public. And again, you know, promoting science, I think

750
00:45:14,280 --> 00:45:16,759
Speaker 1: it's an incredibly important thing. It's not the easiest thing

751
00:45:16,760 --> 00:45:19,759
Speaker 1: in the world to do, especially you know, some scientists

752
00:45:19,800 --> 00:45:22,719
Speaker 1: are so focused on their field they may not be

753
00:45:22,760 --> 00:45:26,360
Speaker 1: the best at communicating that that passion and enthusiasm to

754
00:45:26,440 --> 00:45:30,839
Speaker 1: the general public. Even though they possess it themselves, they

755
00:45:30,880 --> 00:45:33,680
Speaker 1: might not be able to communicate it effectively. So bridging

756
00:45:33,719 --> 00:45:37,440
Speaker 1: that gap is really important so that the public understands

757
00:45:37,440 --> 00:45:40,120
Speaker 1: why this is important and gets excited. It also helps

758
00:45:40,120 --> 00:45:44,960
Speaker 1: with funding. Um it might inspire the next private company

759
00:45:45,080 --> 00:45:48,080
Speaker 1: to try and go into something that they wouldn't have

760
00:45:48,120 --> 00:45:52,680
Speaker 1: done before. So yeah, the the this is really a

761
00:45:52,680 --> 00:45:56,200
Speaker 1: true domino effect, right. It's amazing the sort of stuff

762
00:45:56,200 --> 00:45:58,719
Speaker 1: that can come out of a mission like this that

763
00:45:59,080 --> 00:46:04,759
Speaker 1: may not even be obvious at first glance. Yep, and

764
00:46:04,800 --> 00:46:07,439
Speaker 1: eventually we're gonna have to get off this rock. Well yeah,

765
00:46:07,640 --> 00:46:11,359
Speaker 1: and we should mention also. NASA currently only has one

766
00:46:11,440 --> 00:46:16,360
Speaker 1: other Mars mission planned, which is a launch in of

767
00:46:16,400 --> 00:46:22,000
Speaker 1: the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution um SO or MAVEN

768
00:46:22,200 --> 00:46:25,040
Speaker 1: this name of that, and don't really have a creative

769
00:46:25,080 --> 00:46:28,759
Speaker 1: acronym for that. I'm who would have thunk it. Maven's

770
00:46:28,840 --> 00:46:33,320
Speaker 1: purpose is to study the atmosphere of Mars. So again,

771
00:46:33,400 --> 00:46:35,719
Speaker 1: the rovers we are sending are mostly looking at the

772
00:46:35,719 --> 00:46:40,160
Speaker 1: composition of the soil and the geological formations that are

773
00:46:40,160 --> 00:46:43,120
Speaker 1: on Mars, and to really look at the various layers

774
00:46:43,120 --> 00:46:45,160
Speaker 1: that someone of the reasons why we landed uh, the

775
00:46:45,200 --> 00:46:47,520
Speaker 1: curiosity of a crater is because they can look at

776
00:46:47,520 --> 00:46:50,960
Speaker 1: different layers on the surface of Mars and see how

777
00:46:51,000 --> 00:46:54,520
Speaker 1: it's how it has changed over time. But this will

778
00:46:54,560 --> 00:46:56,360
Speaker 1: be more to look at the atmosphere. We do not

779
00:46:56,520 --> 00:47:00,480
Speaker 1: have any manned missions to Mars planned, at least not

780
00:47:00,560 --> 00:47:03,720
Speaker 1: NASA UM and there are other nations in the world

781
00:47:03,719 --> 00:47:06,399
Speaker 1: that are also planning missions to Mars. NASA has only

782
00:47:06,440 --> 00:47:10,759
Speaker 1: got the one and then after that, who knows. Um,

783
00:47:10,880 --> 00:47:13,879
Speaker 1: we don't have any planned missions to Mars. There are

784
00:47:13,960 --> 00:47:18,120
Speaker 1: some companies. There are some companies that have talked about it, uh,

785
00:47:18,160 --> 00:47:20,799
Speaker 1: and some of the plans are kind of insane. But

786
00:47:20,840 --> 00:47:23,759
Speaker 1: if you really want to hear a pretty crazy idea

787
00:47:23,840 --> 00:47:28,000
Speaker 1: about landing on Mars, my favorite is the first one

788
00:47:28,040 --> 00:47:31,880
Speaker 1: that I could come across, the first published um plan

789
00:47:32,239 --> 00:47:34,719
Speaker 1: or calculation of what it would take to to send

790
00:47:34,760 --> 00:47:39,880
Speaker 1: a manned mission to Mars, and it comes from Verna Magnus,

791
00:47:39,920 --> 00:47:45,279
Speaker 1: Maximilian Friar von Brown or Verna von Brown as most

792
00:47:45,280 --> 00:47:49,280
Speaker 1: people would know, who was a rocket scientist rocket scientists

793
00:47:49,320 --> 00:47:53,160
Speaker 1: during World War Two built rockets for the Germans. After

794
00:47:53,320 --> 00:47:57,240
Speaker 1: the end of World War Two, the United States UM

795
00:47:57,440 --> 00:48:00,640
Speaker 1: essentially took him and put him to work for the

796
00:48:00,719 --> 00:48:04,920
Speaker 1: U S Rocket program. Uh, it was That's a political

797
00:48:05,040 --> 00:48:08,120
Speaker 1: story that is fascinating, and you should all write to

798
00:48:08,239 --> 00:48:11,160
Speaker 1: stuff you missed in history class to talk about that. Actually,

799
00:48:11,200 --> 00:48:15,360
Speaker 1: that'd be a fascinat fascinating podcast. But anyway, Van Brown

800
00:48:15,480 --> 00:48:18,040
Speaker 1: first made rockets for the Germans and then began to

801
00:48:18,080 --> 00:48:19,880
Speaker 1: make rockets for the United States. And one of the

802
00:48:19,880 --> 00:48:23,440
Speaker 1: things he thought of back in nineteen was what it

803
00:48:23,480 --> 00:48:26,719
Speaker 1: would take to send a manned mission to Mars. It

804
00:48:26,760 --> 00:48:30,319
Speaker 1: wasn't published till nineteen fifty two. Eventually became an appendix

805
00:48:30,360 --> 00:48:32,840
Speaker 1: in a novel he wrote, which was a fictional account

806
00:48:32,880 --> 00:48:35,359
Speaker 1: of what that mission would be like. The novel, from

807
00:48:35,400 --> 00:48:40,879
Speaker 1: what I understand, is not UM terribly good, I did

808
00:48:40,880 --> 00:48:44,600
Speaker 1: not publish until two thousand and six. But anyway, in

809
00:48:44,680 --> 00:48:47,759
Speaker 1: his in his version, it was going to be a

810
00:48:47,960 --> 00:48:54,320
Speaker 1: ten spacecraft mission where these ten spacecrafts would carry about

811
00:48:54,400 --> 00:48:58,919
Speaker 1: seventy crew members total, and the spacecraft would go into

812
00:48:59,040 --> 00:49:04,360
Speaker 1: orbit around Ours and then the mission the the ground

813
00:49:04,360 --> 00:49:09,799
Speaker 1: mission crews would detach from the orbiting UM spacecraft in

814
00:49:10,000 --> 00:49:14,680
Speaker 1: winged vehicles that had skis at the bottom of them

815
00:49:14,680 --> 00:49:18,560
Speaker 1: and would land at the polar caps on Mars. The

816
00:49:18,600 --> 00:49:22,120
Speaker 1: thought being that the polar caps would be flat and

817
00:49:22,200 --> 00:49:24,120
Speaker 1: so that would be the best place to land. Then

818
00:49:24,120 --> 00:49:28,080
Speaker 1: they would take Mars crawlers to the equator on Mars,

819
00:49:28,120 --> 00:49:31,560
Speaker 1: which would take about eighty days I think, and then

820
00:49:31,760 --> 00:49:35,759
Speaker 1: build base camp there and then would come back to

821
00:49:35,880 --> 00:49:40,880
Speaker 1: Earth when the those orbits would line up properly. Again.

822
00:49:41,320 --> 00:49:47,120
Speaker 1: So that was his idea. UM didn't happen. It was

823
00:49:47,160 --> 00:49:54,080
Speaker 1: It was an incredibly um Uh, I don't know difficult,

824
00:49:54,840 --> 00:49:56,880
Speaker 1: I have difficult project. I mean it would have. It

825
00:49:56,880 --> 00:50:00,799
Speaker 1: would have been much harder than anything else we have

826
00:50:00,840 --> 00:50:04,960
Speaker 1: attempted so far. So but that that was my favorite

827
00:50:05,080 --> 00:50:08,680
Speaker 1: of the proposed Martian expeditions, although there are some other

828
00:50:08,680 --> 00:50:10,839
Speaker 1: ones there's been. There was one that was more like

829
00:50:10,920 --> 00:50:16,200
Speaker 1: a reality television show, um which was a private endeavor

830
00:50:16,320 --> 00:50:18,560
Speaker 1: and I won't go into it, but it did sound

831
00:50:18,600 --> 00:50:22,919
Speaker 1: pretty crazy. So there have been some interesting proposals for

832
00:50:23,000 --> 00:50:27,080
Speaker 1: trips to Mars. Mostly it looks like for the foreseeable

833
00:50:27,080 --> 00:50:30,800
Speaker 1: future it's going to be unmanned missions from most of

834
00:50:30,800 --> 00:50:35,120
Speaker 1: the world unless some crazy person with lots of money

835
00:50:35,600 --> 00:50:38,080
Speaker 1: gets behind it and and and does what we think

836
00:50:38,200 --> 00:50:41,520
Speaker 1: is think of as the impossible, which after the Curiosity

837
00:50:41,640 --> 00:50:43,880
Speaker 1: ro overlanding, I'm not sure my my definition of the

838
00:50:43,920 --> 00:50:47,320
Speaker 1: impossible needs to be adjusted. It was certainly not a

839
00:50:47,360 --> 00:50:51,440
Speaker 1: mission impossible, that's true. That wraps up this classic episode

840
00:50:51,560 --> 00:50:54,080
Speaker 1: of text stuff. I hope you guys enjoyed it. It

841
00:50:54,160 --> 00:50:58,799
Speaker 1: was fun to revisit this. I remember actually following the

842
00:50:58,840 --> 00:51:04,080
Speaker 1: progress of the Curiosity as it was happening, or really,

843
00:51:04,640 --> 00:51:07,600
Speaker 1: you know, several minutes after it had happened because of

844
00:51:07,640 --> 00:51:11,880
Speaker 1: the communications delay between Mars and Earth, and it was

845
00:51:11,960 --> 00:51:16,840
Speaker 1: absolutely thrilling. I always find anything to do with space

846
00:51:17,120 --> 00:51:20,800
Speaker 1: and space exploration to be really interesting and exciting, pushing

847
00:51:20,800 --> 00:51:25,120
Speaker 1: back the boundaries of our ignorance, incredible engineering achievement of

848
00:51:25,160 --> 00:51:27,840
Speaker 1: getting stuff into space. So I hope you guys enjoyed

849
00:51:27,880 --> 00:51:31,080
Speaker 1: this classic episode. If you have any suggestions for future

850
00:51:31,080 --> 00:51:34,400
Speaker 1: topics for tech Stuff episodes, send me an email the

851
00:51:34,440 --> 00:51:38,839
Speaker 1: addresses tech Stuff at how stuff works dot com. If

852
00:51:38,880 --> 00:51:42,160
Speaker 1: you want some of your very own tech stuff merchandise,

853
00:51:42,360 --> 00:51:46,160
Speaker 1: like a tech stuff coffee mug, which I have and

854
00:51:46,400 --> 00:51:50,520
Speaker 1: trust me, coffee just taste better in it, you can

855
00:51:50,520 --> 00:51:53,400
Speaker 1: go check that out at t public dot com slash

856
00:51:53,440 --> 00:51:56,720
Speaker 1: tech stuff. That's t E e Public dot com slash

857
00:51:56,760 --> 00:52:00,000
Speaker 1: tech stuff, or drop me a line on Facebook or Twitter.

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Speaker 1: I'm happy to hear from you. The handle for both

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Speaker 1: of those is tech Stuff H s W. And don't

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Speaker 1: forget to follow us on Instagram and I'll talk to

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Speaker 1: you again really soon. For more on this and thousands

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Speaker 1: of other topics, is it how stuff works dot com.